Manufacturers and developers are continually active in the field of portable CD players and like devices. There are numerous designs and styles of portable CD systems that are commercially available under a wide variety of brand names. Typically a portable CD player of prior-art has a capacity to play only one music CD at a time and does not have a capacity for CD storage of extra CDs. Therefore a user must carry extra CDs along with the portable player, such CDs typically stored in a separate carrier of which there are many designs. The industry has largely overlooked certain user needs or desires particularly in the area of a physical storage and ready accessibility of CD media for use with portable players. In the case of a separate CD case or carrier, a user must take extra precaution to insure that the carrier or case is not misplaced, stolen, or otherwise unavailable when the user whishes to access it while using a portable CD player.
There have been some efforts in the art to address the problem of CD storage capacity related to a portable CD player. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,222,809 issued to Totsuka, referred to hereinafter as Totsuka, provides a transparent door that supports a slot enabling a user to store one extra CD while another CD is loaded in the CD playing compartment. While this device has a built in storage slot capable of storing one CD, it does not provide the type of storage capacity that would be considered adequate by many users. Most users typically switch music selections quite frequently when listening to a portable CD player. The desired number of selections may come from a plurality of different CDs. Therefore, a user still must rely on a separate storage facility to retrieve a next CD containing one or more selections for play. The art of Totsuka accomplishes little in this regard.
Another attempt to provide an easily accessible storage medium is taught by U.S. Pat. No. 6,375,057, which describes a separate CD carrying case, which is adapted to also carry a portable CD player such that the player controls are visible and accessible, the player can be operated, and extra CDs can be retrieved from a storage area supported on the case. However, the case is still inherently separate from and not an integral part of the player. Such a solution may present additional problems such as contribution to player overheating and subsequent early demise of player components. Furthermore a third-party case acts to obscure the player design and logo, and typically does not match players of differing design and input indicia arrays of the player. Changing batteries and other maintenance options would still require separation of the player from the CD storage case.
In light of the shortcomings of the prior-art described above, what is clearly needed is a portable CD player having a CD storage mechanism integrated therewith wherein at least several extra CDs may be stored and retrieved without effecting operation of the unit as a CD player.